I’ve blown over 30 sets of candles in my life.
Most birthdays spent wishing I could sing.
I remember the last time I asked for this one thing,
Realizing I don’t have the necessary vocal strings.
But could put into metaphors, lyrics what I think.
I stopped wishing there and then, on my 10th,
For a voice that’d give me strength, just I wait.

30 doesn’t sound like a lot if counting my breath
Warm whispers that keep away rapid death.
30 reps pump my chest, 30 degrees is hot.
30 likes on a poem’s a lot, 30 on my selfie is not.
30 years young I decide will not bring me stress,
Bring on as many second adolescences as I have left.

For my birthday this year, I wish for a full fridge.
So that with it, I can build long, delicious bridges.
For my family, friends, lovers to be here with me,
I wish my homies are healthy, happy, at peace,
And for many more years, share stories and tea
That might spill, and show off our vulnerability.

I wish to fall in love constantly and against all the last decade’s wishes, stay single. As in centred, focused, whole, in what most of my self-help books have foretold. Life is worth living because of the people we keep around as we get old. I hear the birthday song, the beautiful melody, the voices in unison and join the chant with my mediocre tune. My lifelong worth of wishes came true. 

I sing myself a happy birthday because I get to celebrate it here with all of you. 

Today is my birthday.

As the years pass, I feel like I’m evolving into a body and mind that better fits the old soul I was born with. Although inevitable, it is a privilege to age, especially in the LGBTQ+ community, but what I would like to celebrate today is the opportunity to grow. Grow up, grow fond, grow apart.

An early memory that I can pinpoint rapid growth to was when I, age 6, wrote a confession to my parents about who had clogged the toilet with toilet paper. They had cancelled my sister’s and I’s nightly storytime and that would not stand. I had to act, swallow my shame, and leave them a letter at their bedroom entrance that must have said something like: “It was I, I clogged the bathroom and, worst of all, said nothing when storytime was cancelled.”

Decades later, I remember writing what I’d say to my school’s Head of Program after a couple of bullies, who caught wind I was gay, started to throw homophobic threats around. Eventually, this conflict led to me coming out to my parents. Without a script, I rendered my emotions in real time during that Zoom call home, kicking off another era of massive growth in my life when I “formally” joined queer spaces and started to befriend my fellow gays.

Dating and being alone at bars sucked. I wish someone had warned me, I think there were lessons that didn’t need to be learned through experience. I’m extremely grateful today for spaces like The Birdhouse for the buddy system and their practices adjacent to the Good Night Out Campaign. In this last year, I’ve noticed a younger vibe in the crowd at some of the bars I frequent. Some are incapable of saying “I’m not interested”, “not right now”, “please don’t touch me” when unwanted attention comes their way, others, stunned when that unwanted attention doesn’t take a hint to back off. I see myself in them.

I wrote this spoken word poem from a night we came together to celebrate another year of our lives passing by:

Well hello there Daddy.
I caught you looking and thought to say hello.
I’ve seen this on a porno, how these things go.
“What are you into? What are you looking for?”
I guess, a short convo or to get down on all four.
To submit into obedience in a kink experience.
We can both play our roles, say it’s coincidence,
To find guidance in another generation’s resolutions.

Instead, you offer your hand and ask to dance.
So close to midnight, I see it’s time and give him a chance.

Knowing we’ll recreate dynamics from before.
From when we were boys and didn’t know more.
Tell me Daddy, did you have a Daddy to call you son?
Or buddy? Or bro? Or baby? Or boy?
Did you have someone to say you’re valuable?
Without queer role models to show us the hopes,
On sex or intimacy, how to untie bondage ropes.
Tangling my neck on all these cables and cords,
I’m choking, I can’t breathe, I let the pressure go.
Out of one patriarchy and into another. I say no.

I look for things that’ll ground my concussions.
Your crow’s feet, furrowed brow and bruises
Remind me of my muses, past, present, future.
Age befits your years of experience and culture,
Your fingers in my hair untie curls with nurture
Soothingly against the grain of a calm brain.

This is my kink, agency to see if we’re in sync and
What’s meant to be addressed by a shrink.
Have we met before, Daddy? I was but a twink,
Fresh meat at a gay bar, my glasses tinted pink.
Looking for greener grass, getting ass grabbed.
The sexual revolution says to get your needs met
But even people leaving the sex party say meh.
As if that’s the point of it all, to get your dick wet.
Not the safe spaces for the rest of the alphabet.
Not the right to exist, you have it, so you forget.
Not the shame taught everywhere as a preset.
The default morals I recall and bring me regret,
Versus the gay values reducing me to an asset.
Hard earned, liberating, blissful gay sodomy.
Personally, would that make my best self happy?
To have 30 random stranger loads inside of me?
Would it cure me? To assimilate foreign culture?

Under pressure? Fuck no. Freely, I don’t know.
The lack of conclusions glitch with my delusions.
Daddy, I recognize you as my reality fractures.
Plot twist, reparenting myself in a meta rupture.
In your eyes, Father Time shows me my future.
I’m in a modern orgy of what feels right for us 3.
That I’m present Me, I’m Daddy, and I’m Baby.
New Year’s a step closer to that state of mind
Where I don’t perpetuate outdated philosophy,
Whilst adapting ideas that preserve my sanity,
Integrity’s reconstructed protecting my inner child with
A confident introspection I practice and embody.
Midnight. Alone on the dance floor when a man comes up to me.
He asks for my name. You can call me “Daddy”.

Being able to verbally request and provide consent is oftentimes not prioritized by men. Historically, bathhouses, circuit parties and cruising communities thrive on physical expressions of interest. It’s imperative and fun to learn to recognize and apply these cues in those spaces, but outside of them, they seem more like outdated survival strategies for generations and legal frameworks that should be more aware of power dynamics.

Suddenly, I’m being addressed as “daddy”, “zaddy”, “stud”, even “sir”. I find myself on the other side of my experiences: I share with friends the weight of responsibility I feel on my shoulders. I don’t want to treat these men like I was treated and I’d rather carry this awkward awareness forward than continue to inadvertently perpetuate harm between us. Some say its a heavy burden to carry, most have simply grown used or fond of it. Others deny and gaslight the idea that sexual assault happens around us, best to grow apart from those people. I’m relieved there’s more public conversations facing the challenges of entering gay spaces for the first time, providing advice and validation that for me came later in life when I felt heard and seen in friends’ stories.

Dating and being alone at bars still kinda sucks. Recently, I went out on my own again, like I did years ago when I came out, knowing now the impact of meeting at least one friendly face. I went out knowing my worth and the difference that makes in who and how men interact with me. I went out confident in the work I’ve put in so far and how strange it will feel to change. I went out on stage to compete for the biggest ass competition, and lost. 

There’s plenty to celebrate today: the community spaces that allow for vulnerability to exist, the privilege to age, my 31st birthday, the confidence to speak my mind, and most importantly, the growth of a social circle, aka my friends. It is mainly through them that I’m de-aging my old soul, like a gay Benjamin Button, and relearning what it’s like to be included, safe and silly. I’ve grown into what my therapist would call my Protector persona, partially because of the years, but mainly due to the kind and understanding connections around me. I have no doubt that my Protector is a kaleidoscope of me and all the past, present, good, bad, long, short friendships I’ve had the opportunity to interact and learn from. Thank you for helping me become a person capable of saying, kindly and unapologetically, “no”. 

I love you all, as friends.